Readers:

Sister power

by Rod Smith

Having my Durbanite sister in my home in the USA for the past three months has been an indescribable joy. Jennifer is so at home among us that you’d think she’d done a lot more in our home and in this city than a visit for a few months every few years.

She knows and is known by more people than some who have lived here their whole lives.

There’s something more powerful about an adult sibling’s extended visit than the joys and the stories shared over meals, than making each other coffee or tea in the mornings, or exploring the shopping areas or visiting a series of favorite restaurants.

My sister (and a brother, for both have visited me for an extended time recently) knows me. Her knowledge goes deeper than the knowledge possessed by any other people in my cadre of relationships.

She sees beyond any attempts at pretense and calls them for what they are in the nicest and kindness of ways. My sister really knows my children and she knows how to love them. The added bonus is that when she is with us they see me, their single parent, engaged in a mutual and respectful adult-to-adult relationship right within the walls of their own house.